Dishler Laser - Blog

Most everyone has heard of the four C's of diamonds that are carat, color, cut and clarity (not necessarily in that order).  We have found that there are also four C's in LASIK which gives a basis to begin to evaluate LASIK providers and the decision to have this procedure.  The first one that comes to mind is COST (this could be for diamonds also but they don't mention it for some reason).  The second is COMFORT since nobody or almost nobody wants to experience pain.  The third C is Convenience of the visits, the procedure, and lifestyle impact in general.  And the final C is the most important one, credibility.  You will notice that I did not mention anything about results which are implicit that the reasons people want laser vision correction are to see better, and we have already discussed how with the best technology available today, the results are in general excellent.

Tomorrow, June 29th is the one year anniversary of appearing on the Tom Martino show, and this week we are bringing a patient who had LASIK with Dr. Jon Dishler one year ago.  Our guest, Brian, is an avid golfer, and he is going to share how having LASIK last summer improved his game both right away and now a year later.  Brian began with 20/100 vision, and had trouble with contacts drying on his eyes.  He couldn't see the alarm clock when he woke up, and he had a lot of trouble especially on windy days.  Now he can see better than 20/20 which is a common experience of our LASIK patients.  He is able to be very competitive at golf and enjoy all the activities that summer offers.

It was early in the 1990's before anyone even thought about LASIK that we were first with another procedure, ALK.  In Automated Lamellar Keratoplasty (ALK) we used a microkeratome to make a thin flap on the cornea, and then removed a small amount of corneal tissue to reduce severe nearsightedness (sound familiar?).  This procedure was an outgrowth of an even older procedure where the front of the cornea was reshaped using a lathe, that dates back about forty years!  This new procedure was a major advancement, and I published on our results with nine other doctors from around the country, many of whom are leaders in their own community in refractive vision corrective surgery.  What we learned in these procedures made us realize that although our results were promising, they were inexact and needed the refinement that a laser could offer. 

We can talk all day long about our experience, technology, and culture at Dishler Laser, but if patients are not happy with the final result, we have not been successful.  Recently we sent out an e-mail survey to a consecutive group of over 100 patients asking about their experience, their results, and their satisfaction with our services.  I am happy to report to you that 97% of the respondents were satisfied, very satisfied, or extremely satisfied with their results.  Of the few people who were not satisfied, we investigated the reasons and in all but one case it had to do with administrative reasons, not their vision.

We understand that it is impossible to make everyone totally happy, and this survey has shown us what we are doing right, and a few areas that we can further improve.  Considering the wide range of people and their vision challenges that we face, this is and extremely gratifying outcome.

While we have had superb results in general with our Zeiss Laser platform for 80% of patients, there are some who have extreme corrections that we have been treating with the Allegretto laser and who have had unexpectedly good results.  This opens the door for many who have wanted LASIK but were told that they had vision which was beyond what can be fixed with this method.  In general, patients with very strong glasses correction can benefit greatly with the newer laser method called "Optivision."

There has been much discussion about LASIK on this site and others about the technology, the cost, experience, and outcomes.  At the end of the day, each person must make a decision about whether vision correction is the right decision for them.  While many people try to logically make a decision if LASIK is a good choice, and if this is a good time, what most people ultimately find after having LASIK is that it was one of the best decisions that they ever made.  Why?  Because it frees them from the constant tether to glasses or contact lenses which were the only alternative.  We make many decisions throughout our lives to improve our quality of life, and LASIK is perhaps one of the most important of those decisions.